Quick Answer: What Is Xin Qiji’s Ugly Slave About?
Ugly Slave (丑奴儿, Chǒunú’ér) is the tune title of a ci (词, cí) lyric by Xin Qiji (辛弃疾, Xīn Qìjí). It contrasts a youth who could write about sorrow without knowing it with a speaker who knows it and holds back.[1][2]
- Then: He climbs a tower and finds a way to talk about sorrow for the sake of a new lyric.
- Now: He starts to speak and then stops, twice.
- Ending: The line he actually says is about how cool the autumn weather is.[1]
The two stanzas repeat the same pattern while changing what the speaker is able to say.[1]
The speaker has found out what sorrow tastes like. The reader might expect a description of it to follow. Instead, he hesitates, repeats the hesitation and says something about the weather. To hear that last line fully, go back to the time when he found it easy to talk about grief.
Ugly Slave in Chinese, Pinyin and English
The two stanzas follow the same pattern. Each opens with a longer line, repeats a short phrase, and closes with a longer one. The English keeps each repetition in place.[1]
| Chinese | Pinyin | English sense |
|---|---|---|
| 少年不识愁滋味 | Shàonián bù shí chóu zīwèi | In youth I did not know the taste of sorrow. |
| 爱上层楼 | Ài shàng cénglóu | I loved to go up to the tower. |
| 爱上层楼 | Ài shàng cénglóu | I loved to go up to the tower. |
| 为赋新词强说愁 | Wèi fù xīn cí qiǎng shuō chóu | To make a new lyric, I made myself speak of sorrow. |
| 而今识尽愁滋味 | Érjīn shí jìn chóu zīwèi | Now I know that taste through and through. |
| 欲说还休 | Yù shuō huán xiū | I want to speak, then stop. |
| 欲说还休 | Yù shuō huán xiū | I want to speak, then stop. |
| 却道天凉好个秋 | Què dào tiān liáng hǎo ge qiū | Instead I say, “How cool it is. What a fine autumn.” |
What Changes Between the Two Stanzas
The opening lines differ in what the speaker knows. As a youth, he did not recognise the taste of sorrow. Now he knows it thoroughly. “Taste” makes that knowledge experiential. The contrast concerns what has happened to him and what he can bring himself to say about it.[1]
The first repeated phrase is an action the young person loves. The phrase has him going up the tower twice in the reader’s hearing. He can bring himself to say “sorrow” when he needs a subject for a lyric. The second stanza repeats a different action. Each time he is about to speak, he stops. Repetition lets a reader experience the same pause twice. The phrase 欲说还休 (yù shuō huán xiū) also survives as an expression for wanting to speak and then holding back.[1][4]
Why the Last Line Talks About Autumn
The last line is an ordinary thing to say. Its force comes from what the preceding lines have led the reader to expect. The words of weather can be sincere. They can also be something safe to say when the speaker decides to leave the subject alone.[1]
The tone shifts differently at the close of The Broken Battle Formation. There, Xin gives one blunt detail about age after an imagined campaign. Here the short remark about cool weather lets the reader feel what is being withheld. The two endings put a large emotion beside something a listener could notice on an ordinary day.
What the Tune Title and Wall Inscription Tell Us
Ugly Slave translates the name of the tune. The tune is also listed under Cai Sang Zi (采桑子, Cǎi Sāng Zǐ), often rendered as Picking Mulberries. A subtitle identifies this lyric as an inscription on a wall along the road at Boshan. That title locates the act of writing in the received tradition and helps distinguish this text from other lyrics in the same pattern.[1][2]
The military and official career of Xin Qiji gives readers a wider setting for his lyrics. The author wrote in several moods and registers. Here the speaker withholds the cause of his sorrow, leaving the tension between feeling and speech at the centre of the lyric.[1][3]
FAQs About Xin Qiji’s Ugly Slave
Is Ugly Slave the name of a character?
It is the tune name. The subtitle about the wall at Boshan and the first line about youth identify this particular lyric.[1][2]
Does the poem give the reason for the speaker’s sorrow?
It gives the difference between speaking easily in youth and stopping oneself later. The lyric leaves the events behind the later sorrow unnamed.[1]
Sources
[1] Xin Qiji. Ugly Slave: Written on a Wall on the Road at Boshan
[2] Xin Qiji. Lyrics to Cai Sang Zi
[3] Renditions, Chinese University of Hong Kong. Xin Qiji
[4] Ministry of Education, Taiwan. 欲說還休